Thursday, July 24, 2014

This just in: Joanna Gruesome, Maybeshewill

Joanna Gruesome - Jerome (liar)

We're off to Indietracks this weekend, as you might have reasonably imagined, where one of the big draws is going to be JoGru's increasingly manaically ferocious presence. They and Trust Fund - he/they are there too - are releasing a split 12", three new tracks each, on 22nd September, this first taste of which harks back to their earlier EPs as Alanna and Owen sort of harmonise over elasticated fuzzbomb pop-post-punk which occasionally breaks free and surges like a sudden mini-typhoon.

Stratospheric post-rockish guitars and stately electronics have served Maybeshewill well enough for three albums, by and large, but the first track to escape from fourth full-length Fair Youth, due 25th August, feels like a further step upwards in ambition, all peaks and troughs, minimal piano and subtly heroic strings and brass aid the slowest of builds to something that in refusing to quite become enormous just for the sake of it might resemble synesthesia of ice floes. Maybeshewill are playing out too this weekend, at Tramlines.